Thursday, September 21, 2006

I guess when your voter base

are members of the KKK and the CCC, the last thing you want to do is admit you're actually Jewish. Josh Marshall quotes the good parts:

Lumbroso was raised as a Jew in Tunisia. But when she came to the US and married George's dad she pretended to be a Christian because she didn't think her husband's family would accept her and also because she didn't want her family to experience what she experienced in World War II. So she never told her family, until George confronted her about it last month. She admitted it was true. She said she was afraid he didn't love her anymore. But no, he said, "Mom, I respect you more than ever."...

Further down, there's a slightly different explanation, or at least another layer of it. Speaking of Allen's father, she says, "He didn't want me to tell his mother. At that time, that was a no-no, to marry outside the church."

A man who's quick to defend the Confederate flag as a symbol of "heritage and regional pride" has been awfully hesitant to acknowledge his own heritage, one that might cast a little cloud on the boot-wearing, tobacco-chewing, racist-coddling image he has created for himself. Should that matter to anyone looking for the "authentic" candidate in the Virginia Senate race? Sure. Will it hurt Allen with the kind of folks who clapped and cheered when he asked them to join him in welcoming "macaca" to America? It's probably too soon to tell. Allen is already off courting a new voting constituency just in case. The senator said in his statement Tuesday that he's proud to be at least a little bit Jewish, and his campaign attacked Democratic challenger Jim Webb as the real anti-Semite in the race.

Let me guess: Allen is going to get bar-mitzvahed and start wearing tfillin, while his wife lights the Sabbath candles every Friday night?